The Same Difference
by soruen
Summary: AU Set in modern times where ninjas, madougus and flame casters do not exist. See how Kurei's life managed to turn out wrong in the correct way anyway.


The Same Difference - Kurei Arc

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~Five~

Kurei was five when his childhood ends. Ever since he could remember, life was hard, and his family only consisted of his mother and him. There was no father in Kurei's life except for the faded, crumpled piece of photo he knew his mother kept under her pillow which she sometimes took out late at night to stare at. Most of the times with tears streaming down her face silently. She only did that when she thought he was asleep, of course.

However, their home was a tiny one room apartment, and five year old Kurei could hear clearly the suppressed sobs of his mother and the small splashing sound when her tears hit the floor.

Despite being just five, Kurei had long understood the unfairness of life. Every time he saw his poor, fragile mother coughing on her way to work, his heart clenched, but of course he did not allow to let if show on his face. All he could do instead was schooling it into a smile as he sent her off.

They had barely enough money to get by; Kurei knew even when his mother desperately tried to hide the truth from him and covered up her sadness with confident smile.

He knew things were getting worse when he heard faint arguing sounds one day from outside the front door where his mother reasoned (reasoned, because his mother was above pleading) with the landlord for a few more days before paying their overdue rent.

He knew things would not be getting better even though his mother claimed it would. And soon her occasional cough turned into a constant one and tormented his mother even in the dead of the night.

He knew too, that they were not saving money to move to a bigger house where he would get a whole room all to himself when three meals a day cut into two. And even then, rice being served was rare and his mother could hardly be on a diet when she was as thin as she could be, already teetering on the edge of being unhealthily so.

But throughout it all, Kurei spoke not a word of what he understood to his mother, and smiled at her when she left for work. He spoke not a word of the hurtful words their neighbours spoke when she was at work, or of the cruel jeers that the other children threw at him along with sticks and stones whenever she sent him out to 'play'.

Kurei was still five when he learnt of death and loneliness; knowing that his mother would no longer speak or smile or even cough when she went to sleep one day and he woke up to find her body cold.

After covering her up with blankets and arranging it so that she looked as comfortable as she could be, he took out the crumpled piece of photo from underneath her pillow and gave her a final goodbye kiss on her forehead. She was his mother and she did the best she could, it was time she gets a little bit of well deserved rest. She had always given him all the blankets in the house and kept only the thinnest cloth for herself to use; causing her cough to worsen, but it did not matter anymore now.

With only the faded, old photograph in hand, Kurei left the apartment without turning back; except to throw a lighted matchstick, the very last one from the only box in his house. It was a chilly night, yet Kurei felt none of that as the whole building started to get eaten up by flames so beautiful he almost wanted to stay; almost, but he didn't because he had more important things to do.

He flipped over the old, worn photograph and headed out to meet his father.

He found the man with some difficulty, though it was nothing he could not handle. Kurei knew life was not like the fairy tales his mother sometimes likes to read to him when life had been a little better, and he most certainly could not waltz up to the man and hoped for his life to be happily ever after.

Kurei knew better, and he was proven correct when a moment later, he spotted the figure of a woman behind the man, smiling and cooing at a tiny bundle in her arms. Kurei's eyes turned a little icier when a cry emerged from the bundle and the two adults bend over to look at it with tender looks that Kurei had never been subjected to (for his mother was too strong a woman to show a weakness like tenderness).

There was a churning feeling in his stomach which he had never felt before, but he blamed it on the fact that he had not eaten for three days. The only thoughts Kurei could form before he was swallowed up by darkness, was simply that the two adults looked retarded, making weird faces at the baby in an attempt to stop it from crying.

When he finally comes to, Kurei blinked a few times when he noticed himself on a comfortable bed in a room that was already half the size of the apartment his mother and him had lived in. But what surprised him more was the figure of the man slumped on a chair next to the bed, drooling on a corner of the bed sheets and holding on to a same copy of the photograph Kurei had tightly in one hand. The only difference was that it was neither crumpled nor faded, but somehow Kurei liked the one he had better anyway.

The man was clearly the same one featured in the photograph. It was a nice photograph; Kurei had to admit when he saw it for the first time three days ago. His mother had been younger, healthier and smiling brightly next to this man in it. The man stirred when Kurei sat up, and he mentally sneered at the way the adult fell from the chair clumsily.

"Where…where did you get this photograph?" Asked the man who was most probably his father; and from the way he stared at Kurei and then at the photograph in his hand, Kurei suspected that the man knew the suspicion too.

"It was a memento left to me by my mother." Kurei replied blandly, and felt a twinge of…something in his heart when the man deduced what was left unsaid and gave a look of pure anguished. His proud, beautiful mother was gone; and it was probably this man's fault.

"Reina…your mother is dead?" The man voice was barely louder than a whisper, but somehow it felt loud enough to make Kurei's ears ring. The man, however, did not wait for Kurei to answer and instead engulfed him in a big, tight hug.

The man talked to Kurei for the rest of that night, not minding the fact that not once did Kurei spoke. He told him of beautiful Reina whom he met in high school and blushed red during certain parts of the story, giving guilty glances at Kurei. The man gave a sad smile and gave him a hug before leaving.

And for years long after Kurei's memory of this man grew fuzzy, the warmth from this hug lingered on.

Not long after meeting the man that was probably Kurei's father, there was a lot of chaos. So much so that Kurei stopped trying to keep track of it at all. What used could it be, to listen to shouts of anger between a few adults and an old man? Granted, the looks those scary looking men gave him might be intimidating, if Kurei was not used to dirty looks sent his way from his past neighbours. But the glares they shot his way told him more than enough what the shouting was all about.

The shouting stopped, when the woman with the baby finally spoke. Her soft spoken voice was a big contrast and it made Kurei thought of his mother for a moment. She often spoke to him using the same tone, but of course, his mother's voice sounded much better.

Kurei was made to stay in the room for the next few days, until the man that he suspected was his father was finally proven that he _was_ his father, with some help from the hospital.

In the same year, Kurei lost his mother and found his father. He lived with the man for a short period of time before running away. He was not able to handle the pure happiness that oozed throughout the house from the family of three; only one of which he was willing to call his. Not that he wanted to; because no matter how much he liked and respected the man he now know to be his father, family was not family if it did not include his mother.

Life was a lot better, but it did not make Kurei any happier. The baby, most of all, irked Kurei with his cries, giggles and too bright eyes.

So in the last hour that he was still five, Kurei took the shuriken (1) that his father had placed by his pillow a few hours earlier, completely wrapped in a flowery paper and all, despite the big talk about it being an important heirloom. He brought it to where the baby slept. Half brothers or not, his existence was the main reason for most of Kurei's sufferings.

He brought the knife down; and then amidst the chaos of cries and screams and shouts, he slipped out of the door and left while he could. There was no reason why, except that the baby irked him, being a symbol for all the things that Kurei could have had but never did.

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(1) The picture: www. onemanga .com/Flame_of_Recca/149/14/

Author's note: I tried following events as closely as possibly to the original storyline from the manga, tweaking some tiny facts here and there. Hope you like the story! And I apologize in advance for any grammar mistakes spotted lol


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